


Earning Trust

by samalander



Series: Trust 'Verse [2]
Category: Star Trek XI
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-17
Updated: 2009-06-17
Packaged: 2017-11-11 04:59:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/474779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samalander/pseuds/samalander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/st_xi_kink/3656.html?thread=8044104#t8044104">this</a> prompt on the kinkmeme: <i>Turns out Sulu knows Chekov from back at the Academy. Mainly because he was friends with a bunch of guys who used to tease/harass Chekov relentlessly.</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>Even though he didn't take part, he did stand by and let it happen.</i><br/>Now they've both been assigned to the Enterprise, Sulu finds himself falling for Chekov and wants to prove he's changed!</p><p> </p><p>  <i>He starts following Chekov, trying to talk to him and apologize, but Chekov thinks he's going to be harassed all over again and avoids him, runs away to hide with McCoy, etc.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Earning Trust

It settled into a tenuous truce. Chekov didn't call Sulu a bastard, and Sulu didn't act like one. They ate together once in a while, nodded at each other in the halls, even engaged in a little friendly banter when they were off shift. It seemed to be working out for both of them.

Except that it's totally not.

 

* * *

_Sulu doesn't know, not in any concrete way, that he's in love. He's never been before. Sure, he's had the searing, white-hot hormone flares that all teenagers have, the kind that linger on your skin like sweat when the day is over. But his feeling for Pavel Chekov are something less like an explosion and more like the slow burn of the thrusters, keeping them in orbit above a planet._

Sulu writes that in his log, hoping on some level that it's poetic enough to say to the other man someday. He records a lot of things like that. 

_"You're my star chart home."_ (Which he erases three seconds later because, really? **REALLY?** ) 

_"Pavel is the force that keeps me in orbit around life." (Well, that makes Chekov sound obese and Sulu sound like some kind of obsessed 14-year-old.)_

_"You are the one thing in this galaxy that makes sense."_ (And why in the hell can't Sulu think up a good love metaphor that doesn't involve space? What do they have in common anyway?) 

_"You know, Russians invented love."_ (This one he keeps. If anything is likely to win Chekov over, it's this one.) 

* * *

To say "life went on" feels like a cliché, but it is what happened. Sulu kept piloting, Chekov kept navigating, and Kirk kept almost getting them killed.

During a skirmish with a pair of Klingon warbirds on the edge of the neutral zone, the two of them were executing a flawless Lomcevak when the photon torpedo struck, and Chekov's console exploded into a shower of sparks.

Sulu saw Chekov get thrown from his seat and land with a sickening crunch on his right arm. There was a moment, brilliant and clear, where Sulu remembered vomiting into the Academy's manicured lawns, and then he was back. Assuming control, he fired every god damn weapon he could get his hands on, and gladly watched the bastards explode into their component molecules.

Kirk called for a status report, but Sulu heard none of it. He was at Chekov's side, checking his carotid pulse. Strong and regular. Unworried about repairs, Sulu scooped up the Russian's slim frame and began carrying him to a turbolift.

"Sulu! What are you doing?"

"Captain. His arm. He needs to get to sickbay."

Kirk looked tired, as though the adrenalin of the past few minutes had eaten his enthusiasm. "Come back when you got him there."

Sulu opened his mouth to protest, but Chekov stirred and whimpered and Sulu noticed the fragment of ivory bone jutting out of the young man's forearm.

* * *

Sickbay was a wreck. McCoy was taking casualties from almost every deck, but Sulu managed to get Chekov onto a table by telling Ensign Weaver exactly where he could put his bitten tongue. He left as Nurse Chapel began scanning Chekov – no, Pavel. Limp and broken like that, he wasn't an officer. He was a hurt kid – but only because McCoy threatened to give him a reason to stay.

The rest of the shift was tense, but not the good kind of tense like when Pavel was there and Sulu could feel every muscle in the right side of his body contract with the younger man's breath. It was the kind of tense where every five seconds you look around and hope that something – anything – will give you an excuse to leave. The kind of tense where your jaw starts to hurt and you didn't even know it was clenched.

Sulu found himself checking the time readout every minute. It seemed like days until Lieutenant Kyle relieved him. Sulu practically sprinted to the turbolift, cursing it for not moving faster.

He bolted out of the lift on deck 5, racing around corners until he got to sickbay. He was caught short when he saw Chekov, looking spacy and confused, holding hands with Kevin Riley.

_Son of a Bitch!_

* * *

Chekov was put on reserve for 3 weeks, and Sulu found himself flying with Riley. It was hard not to ask after Chekov, ask how their relationship was going, and for two weeks he almost managed it.

Finally, after the 11th day of flying with Riley, Sulu found himself standing before Chekov's quarters. He lamented, inwardly, not having a card or a present or something. Pavel deserved something.

None the less, he buzzed and, when the door slid open, he entered.

Sulu had never been in Chekov's quarters before. He had always expected it would be cold, covered in beaver skin and old vodka bottles, but it was strangely sparse. A few snapshots, some old-fashioned paper books, and a goldfish swimming in a sealed bowl. Then, on the bed, looking pale and miserable, was Chekov.

"Mr. Sulu. Hello."

"Hello Pa- Hello, Chekov. How are you feeling?"

It was far and away the most awkward conversation Sulu had ever had, rating just above the time Commander Spock had tried to explain the mating habits of the Vulcan sandworm.

"I'm fine. My arm is mostly healed."

"I'm sorry--" Sulu hated himself for a moment, not knowing what to say. "I'm sorry about your arm. Is Leutienant Riley taking good care of you?"

"Riley? Mr. Sulu, Riley has not been taking care of me."

"But... I saw you holding his hand in sickbay."

Chekov laughed. "When I was full of drugs and thought he was my mama? Mr. Sulu, you are making fun."

Sulu felt his worry lift like a weight off his neck, and he sat down, quickly, in the desk chair.

"I'm not making fun of you, Chekov."

"I heard how you took me to Sickbay," Chekov was hitting Hikaru with these green eyes that made his muscles relax. Like some kind of freaky eye massage. If such a thing existed, Sulu knew the Russians would have invented it.

"I told you-- I told you that I wouldn't let anything hurt you. And you got hurt. And I know it's not like I set the console on fire. But I should have moved faster. I shouldn't have suggested the Lomcevak. I should have been hurt, not you."

Chekov nodded solemnly. "And you should have been out on the hull, catching the torpedos. You should have stopped the Klingons all by yourself."

"Now you're making fun."

"Of course I am, Mr. Sulu! You're being.. silly."

"But I promised--"

"Are you going to follow me around and make sure my shoes are tied every day? Hikaru-" Sulu's breath caught in his throat. He'd never heard the Russian man say his name before, and it was like a kiss, like a carress."-I am not a child, no matter how I look. Do you know that?"

"Chekov, I can't change--"

"What Penn did? When he broke my nose? Please, Hikaru. You can feel guilty, but you can't undo it."

"I want to make it up to you."

Chekov nodded and beckoned with his good arm. Sulu stood and approached the bed, sitting gently on the edge of it. Chekov scooped up a book - one of his real, paper books - and handed it to Sulu.

"This is a book by a famous Russian man. Isaac Asimov. Do you know him?"

Sulu nodded, tentativly. "I know of him."

"This is a story he wrote, called _The Caves of Steel_. Have you read it?"

Sulu shook his head, and Chekov pressed the book into his hands.

"Read it and tell me what you think."

 

* * *

Sulu read the book three times in the next five days, looking for, and failing to find, some kind of hidden message in the story. Finally, admitting defeat, he retunred to Chekov's quarters.

The boy was sitting at his desk, watching his fish take lazy laps around the bowl.

"Hello, Hikaru. This is Balyk."

Hikaru nodded and placed the book on the desk.

"Hello, Chekov. Balyk," he half-whispered as he stood awkwardly next to Pavel.

"Did you enjoy the book?"

"Yes," Sulu said, not exactly lying. "But I don't know why you wanted me to read it."

Chekov smiled, and Hikaru thought briefly about how much he loved the way Pavel's eyes gleamed when he smiled.

"Think of it like you are Daneel, and I am Lije. Do you see?"

Sulu furrowed his brow. "You're saying you didn't want to like me?"

"How could I? But you-- you are not the person I thought you were, then."

Sulu smiled, as Chekov finally stopped watching the fish and looked up into his eyes.

"You mean that?"

"Da. Yes. Yes, I do."

Sulu smiled brightly, but resisted the urge to gather Chekov into his arms and kiss the hell out of him. Instead he took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment.

"Well. Would you like to play some chess?"


End file.
